The Final Stretch

Its already May! And if only I could have published this a day earlier just to use the ‘May The Fourth Be With You’ joke! That’s right I’m not a Star Wars fan but anything to jump on the bandwagon for cool puns, I’m there!

These five months have flown by and I can’t believe that I’m actually going to be finishing uni officially in approximately three weeks! Then I have to be a real adult and find a job… and pay tax. Oh the joys awaiting me in the adult world! No more student loan, no more free money to spend lavishly on Nando’s and KFC. The struggle is real!

But let us not depress ourselves just yet, dissertations and exams are here to do that for now! This is the final stretch and it has truly been the longest. The highs and lows, the breakdown phone calls to my parents have suddenly become the norm. The amount of all nighter’s that have taken place, well that have been organised to take place but result in watching Netflix and scuttling to bed at 2am. It’s okay, you’re allowed the odd day off after all the hard working days spent in the library. Let’s face it, they are the most dreadful days. Having to arrive at the library before 9.30am because if you don’t there won’t be a space to sit let alone a computer, surviving on Tesco £3 meal deals all day because you know if you leave to go home for a proper meal you won’t return for several weeks… leaving all your books and paper all over the keyboard so that you can claim your territory in the library because you know some vulture is preying over you to log off and leave… not on my watch mate! I came here at 9.30am and I plan to stay here all day till the library shuts… BUT IT’S A 24 HOUR LIBRARY, so the jokes on you! Muaahaha!

The library has pretty much drove me in to hysterical mode, the stress has become at least one emotional breakdown every three days while listening to How To Save A Life by The Fray because you know you won’t be able to save yours anymore. Yes, you should have gone to that lecture, okay maybe you should have attended the whole module but you can do this… that’s what pro plus was made for, to learn a whole module within a week!

Remember those student nights on a Tuesday that everyone would be at? Forget that! The library is the place to be not only on a Tuesday night, but every night! The smell of Red Bull and Relentless in the air, the missions to the 24 hour McDonald’s down the road for a cheeky cheeseburger, it’s practically a night out!! The extortionate spending in the SU shop, which are supposed to provide cheaper prices by the way, being conned in to buying millions of bags of crisps just because they were all £1…bargain!! Food becomes the new way to lure people to the library, snacks become your bribes and you have to constantly sit rows and rows away from your friends because you know if you don’t, there is no work getting done tonight. That doesn’t stop the WhatsApp groups though! You all meet every hour and it feels like you have life stories to discuss when you saw each other an hour ago and that’s how procrastination begins… the Facebook stalking begins, the Instagram uploading and what’s worst is the Snapchat videos at stupid AM! But they’re not all that bad…your friends become your motivators, it becomes a team activity, everyone goes to the library and everyone’s going to get through this, the library becomes your home and you stare out anyone who tries to walk in to your territorial space of booked tables or booths. That’s right April and May is a student version of Alien V Predator.

It’s not all that bad though, the stress is unreal and the amount of breakdowns are too but when you look back at it, it’s hilarious. The motivation everyone gives each other, the support and faith everyone has in each other to do well is the key motivator… it helps us, it motivates us and reminds us that we will get through this final stretch and it is going to be difficult… but it is definitely going to be worth it! Now back to revision…